Will Bengals let their kids play football?

We asked professional players with children if and when they will let their kids play football

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Marvin Jones

Position: WR

Age: 24

Sons: Marvin III (5), Mareon (2)

When he'll let them play: "Seven, when I did. Little Marv could do well against 7-year-olds, but he plays flag now."

Opinion: "When you can teach them these fundamentals right now it's going to last a lifetime. Why not do that? When they get to high school and college when them boys are big, they are going to hurt themselves. My dad, he was a great player, I drilled with him before even hitting with anyone else. It's really important because that lasts a long time. I remember some stuff I was taught when I was 7 and I kept it the whole way. That will eliminate a lot of the chaos."

Robert Geathers

Position: DE

Age: 30

Son: Robert III (6).

When he'll let him play: Not interested in football yet, but "I wouldn't tell him not to. Just have to be educated on what is going on."

Opinion: "I think you can get the fundamentals of football without doing full-contract football. You can do drills, flag football and get principles of what you need, a good base, without playing. There's a lot of guys in this locker room that didn't play until they were seniors in high school."

Domata Peko

Position: DT

Age: 29

Sons: Domata Jr. (9), Joseph

When he'll let them play: Closer to high school, "I will put him in flag first so he gets the fundamentals of the game."

Opinion: "I have a 9-year old. He's asking me to play already. My wife and I have been talking about it and we just don't want him to start too early and get burned out and get tired of football. I only played one year, my senior year. I played a little bit as a little kid but nothing major. ... There is plenty of time for high school to get contact and stuff. I don't want him getting concussions at a young age with the dangers of that."

Leon Hall

Position: CB

Age: 29

Son: Leon Jr. (5)

When he'll let him play: "He's not really at that age. Now, he's into golf and soccer camp."

Opinion: "When that time comes, obviously, I would want to make sure he's educated on the risks and everything that comes with it. He's still going to be a kid but to a certain extent I should let him make that decision - not the final decision - but give him at least an option."

Clark Harris

Position: LS

Age: 30

Son: Trent (2)

When he'll let him play: "I will let him play whatever he wants to. But I will never push him towards it - but that's because of the contracts. Football isn't guaranteed."

Opinion: "I'm not very worried about the contact aspect. I've gone through my whole career, I mean, I actually used to play football and be a tight end. The injuries, they are going to happen. You can go out there and swing a golf club and blow your back out and do something stupid. Obviously, concussions aren't as much of a risk. In 15 years if we know something different I might change my attitude."

Wallace Gilberry

Position: DE

Age: 29

Son: Brady (5)

When he'll let him play: "If it were up to me I wouldn't let mine play. It's not even the dangers, it's the politics. It's a cut-throat business."

Opinion: "(Danger) comes with the game, that's what you sign up for, let's be honest. If that's what he wants to do I am not going to stop him, but I will let him know what he's getting himself into. End of the day, we get paid to do a job. Your abilities determine how long you last in this business. I'm not going to encourage him to play football, but I'm not going to tell him he can't do it. We don't use that word in our house."

Andrew Whitworth

Position: OL

Age: 32

Sons: Drew (3), Michael (2)

When he'll let them play: "High school. For me, I didn't play until high school and saw numerous kids that didn't play in high school that became good football players."

Opinion: "It's important for people to understand, what does my kid really get out of this? Does my kid get something out of tennis at a young age? Yes, he moves his feet and hand-eye coordination, or baseball with hand-eye coordination. Does he get something out of basketball with moving and jumping and running? Soccer, using their feet. There is a lot of sports to kick and play as a child where they learn athleticism, they learn hand-eye coordination and do those things. What does he really get learning how to push a sled or fight in a big group of kids at 10 years old and get in a pile and blow his leg out? There's just not any advantage to that. To me, that's why I want my kids to do whatever they want but stay away from that kind of contact sport until they get to an age when they are old enough to understand it."

Still, the NFL, particularly in cities like Cincinnati where kids grow up idolizing Geno Atkins and Giovani Bernard, the infiltration of football into the lives of young boys has never seeded deeper or younger. They want to play. Considering the growth of devices locking children to tablets and televisions, wanting to play, exercise and interact with a team represents an important victory.

Yet, famous sports minds such as Kurt Warner, Drew Brees and Bob Costas all publicly admitted they wouldn't allow their own children to play the game. More and more headlines are drawn from concussion lawsuits instead of game growth.

When should your son play football? Should he play football? Well, it depends on who you ask.

Regardless of opinion, however, discussions with doctors, neurosurgeons, coaches, players and youth league administrators, a few common themes emerged:

Youth football has taken a beating, but as much attention needs to be paid to other contact sports, such as hockey and soccer.

More damage can be done to the developing brain than one that has matured by high school.

Concern over kids' lack of physical activity should be considered just as serious an issue as concussions.

Most important, youth football programs must preach education beyond all else to be positive all parties know precisely how to recognize symptoms and treat them appropriately.

BUILDING CONFIDENCE AMONG PARENTS STARTS WITH EDUCATION

Ron Klosterman and Bob Lyons, who run the Greater Catholic Youth League in Cincinnati on top of their day jobs, just want parents to understand the situation. Education means empowerment. It also means survival, considering participation has decreased 12 percent since the league began five years ago.

The GCYL consists of 28 programs, the majority of which span four levels of participation from kindergarten through eighth grade.

Sure, league officials can point out the drop in Catholic school attendance that parallels a portion of the drop in football, but there's no denying the safety concerns over youth concussions kept kids away.

"Every time you turn on the news there is somebody saying something, it's just not good," Lyons said. "We make sure our coaches and parents understand some of the trials and tribulations that we are going through."

The league attempts to confront those trials in the same manner as the NFL. Roger Goodell announced a $45 million donation this year to Heads Up Football, a program in conjunction with USA Football focused on making sure every coach is certified in safe football technique as well as trained in concussion awareness.

Bengals Head Coach Marvin Lewis talks about head trauma and concussions in the NFL on Cincinnati.com Sports Beyond the Stripes with Paul Daugherty presented by: JosephAuto.com.

Lyons, Klosterman and the CYFL joined with Heads Up for the first time this season after years of sending coaches to training with the University of Cincinnati. Investing in a program with the backing and credibility of the NFL was the best method to attack the problem of eduction about the issues.

"USA Football is a major step for our league," Lyons said. "The awareness side is huge for us. That is how we approach the lack of awareness, by trying to have our communication at a high level."

Not only was this a major step on the local level, but nationally. Bengals head coach Marvin Lewis sits on the Heads Up advisory committee and is the only active NFL coach among the 22-member group. He proudly stands behind the direction the program has taken in re-establishing the safety of the sport on a youth level.

As the concussion topic caught fire, he feels, the NFL lost its way. By assuring every youth football coach becomes "Heads Up certified," the sport steals back the narrative.

"We did a poor job of being proactive and talking about football and all the virtues and everything it has done," Lewis said. "We allowed people who are kind of uneducated about it jump on football and cast an unknown shadow and shadow that was unfair. We have pushed that shadow away. We are promoting football. We are promoting safety. We are promoting how to coach football the right way again."

SHOULD PLAYERS WAIT UNTIL HIGH SCHOOL?

The words of Dr. Brett Osborn blare out of the phone with clarity and conviction. The board-certified neurosurgeon, father and author of "Get Serious: A Neurosurgeon's Guide to Optimal Health and Fitness," absolutely sees danger in allowing children younger than 14 or 15 – when the body reaches skeletal maturity – to play contact sports such as football and hockey.

"The head is a big weight and levers back and forth. Acceleration, deceleration can be quite pronounced," he said. "Not only have you grown into your head at maturity but also developed enough strength into muscles of your neck that prohibit the bobble-headed doll effect. You don't hear people talking about that nowadays."

Osborn does. Adamantly. For him, the inability of the neck muscles to support properly against hits significantly increases risk. Waiting until high school for contact sports would be a way to avoid the a portion of it.

While Osborn said he likely wouldn't allow his children to play football until high school, avoiding the second concussion is even more important than protecting against the first. That means extreme precaution and recognition of symptoms such as brief loss of consciousness, memory problems, confusion, ringing in the ears, dizziness, blurred vision, headaches, fatigue and nausea.

"The way to make the biggest dent in context of the long term – not just the single concussion – is a high index of suspicion and education, education, education," he said, stating he advised children with a concussion sit out a minimum six weeks after the injury and 12 weeks if any symptoms persist. "Don't get a second hit in the time your brain is recovering. The answer is pull your children out quickly if you are suspicious of a concussion and don't assume that little Johnny is able to tough it out. In actuality his brain is more susceptible to long-term (complications) and damage than is an older person's brain."

INACTIVY COULD BE A LARGER CONCERN THAN CONCUSSIONS

In the youth concussion debate, Dr. Gregory Myer acknowledges he falls on an opposite end of the spectrum. As the director of research and the Human Performance Laboratory within sports medicine at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, he spends much of his time researching concussions.

He points to the contentions of Dr. Osborn and claims not all come with substantiated evidence. He'll admit the same of his own contention. That's the point. Nobody truly has all the evidence yet to decide on the depth of danger.

Myer dubs much of the outcry as media "creating almost a panic of what can happen to your children." In actuality, for him, more of the panic should surround lack of activity. Pulling children out of organized sports they enjoy can be detrimental to development of motor skills, teamwork, responsibility and discipline.

"We are going so far one way I am concerned if we don't slow it down a little bit and wait for the evidence we might not be able to recover," Myer said. "That is what I am really scared about because the long-term effects of a physically inactive lifestyle is going to be probably a much larger problem for our society than long-term effects of concussions. I don't want to minimize the effects and concerns, but I think we have potentially a bigger epidemic we are facing and we have to be careful."

Few would know more about the evidence than Myer, who acted as a trend-setter analyzing the lack of "brain slosh" in rams and woodpeckers, while joining with the University of Cincinnati on training to increase perception and peripheral vision to increase anticipation of hits.

"The media wants to have something exciting and you want to have a dramatic case so you show that child that was on that team that had a bad experience," he said. "What about the other 30 kids that had a great experience?"

Understanding all sides of the argument and stressing education on the issue hold precedence when mother, father and son sit down to talk about when to start playing football.

"There's no doubt when you have parents coming out saying I'm not sure whether I am going to let my son or daughter play football, that's a big deal," Lewis said. "That's important. We've had to get back and really educate people on what it is all about."

What do professional players with kids think?

Marvin Jones

Position: WR

Age: 24

Sons: Marvin III (5), Mareon (2)

When he'll let them play: "Seven, when I did. Little Marv could do well against 7-year-olds, but he plays flag now."

Opinion: "When you can teach them these fundamentals right now it's going to last a lifetime. Why not do that? When they get to high school and college when them boys are big, they are going to hurt themselves. My dad, he was a great player, I drilled with him before even hitting with anyone else. It's really important because that lasts a long time. I remember some stuff I was taught when I was 7 and I kept it the whole way. That will eliminate a lot of the chaos." "

Robert Geathers

Position: DE

Age: 30

Son: Robert III (6).

When he'll let him play: Not interested in football yet, but "I wouldn't tell him not to. Just have to be educated on what is going on."

Opinion: "I think you can get the fundamentals of football without doing full-contract football. You can do drills, flag football and get principles of what you need, a good base, without playing. There's a lot of guys in this locker room that didn't play until they were seniors in high school."

Domata Peko

Position: DT

Age: 29

Sons: Domata Jr. (9), Joseph

When he'll let them play: Closer to high school, "I will put him in flag first so he gets the fundamentals of the game."

Opinion: "I have a 9-year old. He's asking me to play already. My wife and I have been talking about it and we just don't want him to start too early and get burned out and get tired of football. I only played one year, my senior year. I played a little bit as a little kid but nothing major. … There is plenty of time for high school to get contact and stuff. I don't want him getting concussions at a young age with the dangers of that."

Leon Hall

Position: CB

Age: 29

Son: Leon Jr. (5)

When he'll let him play: "He's not really at that age. Now, he's into golf and soccer camp."

Opinion: "When that time comes, obviously, I would want to make sure he's educated on the risks and everything that comes with it. He's still going to be a kid but to a certain extent I should let him make that decision – not the final decision – but give him at least an option."

Clark Harris

Position: LS

Age: 30

Son: Trent (2)

When he'll let him play: "I will let him play whatever he wants to. But I will never push him towards it – but that's because of the contracts. Football isn't guaranteed."

Opinion: "I'm not very worried about the contact aspect. I've gone through my whole career, I mean, I actually used to play football and be a tight end. The injuries, they are going to happen. You can go out there and swing a golf club and blow your back out and do something stupid. Obviously, concussions aren't as much of a risk. In 15 years if we know something different I might change my attitude."

Wallace Gilberry

Position: DE

Age: 29

Son: Brady (5)

When he'll let him play: "If it were up to me I wouldn't let mine play. It's not even the dangers, it's the politics. It's a cut-throat business."

Opinion: "(Danger) comes with the game, that's what you sign up for, let's be honest. If that's what he wants to do I am not going to stop him, but I will let him know what he's getting himself into. End of the day, we get paid to do a job. Your abilities determine how long you last in this business. I'm not going to encourage him to play football, but I'm not going to tell him he can't do it. We don't use that word in our house."

Andrew Whitworth

Position: OL

Age: 32

Sons: Drew (3), Michael (2)

When he'll let them play: "High school. For me, I didn't play until high school and saw numerous kids that didn't play in high school that became good football players. Physically there is just nothing to me in football that is going to teach a kid a whole lot before the age of 14 or 15."

Opinion: "It's important for people to understand, what does my kid really get out of this? Does my kid get something out of tennis at a young age? Yes, he moves his feet and hand-eye coordination, or baseball with hand-eye coordination. Does he get something out of basketball with moving and jumping and running? Soccer, using their feet. There is a lot of sports to kick and play as a child where they learn athleticism, they learn hand-eye coordination and do those things. What does he really get learning how to push a sled or fight in a big group of kids at 10 years old and get in a pile and blow his leg out? There's just not any advantage to that. To me, that's why I want my kids to do whatever they want but stay away from that kind of contact sport until they get to an age when they are old enough to understand it."